(Updated) Train hits pickup truck in Pottstown

This pickup truck was struck by a Norfolk-Southern train along College Drive near a parking lot for Montgomery County Community College. (21st Century Media/Frank Otto)

By Frank Otto

fotto@p21st-CenturyMedia.com

POTTSTOWN — A small Norfolk Southern freight train headed west with empty flour cars struck a pickup truck which had just dropped off some Montgomery County Community College students in the parking lot on College Drive.

Several Norfolk Southern engines were pushing seven empty cars west on the tracks which run parallel to College Drive when they hit the Ford F-150 pickup truck just after noon Monday, according to Pottstown Police.

“They were going four or five miles an hour,” said Officer Ron Taylor. “No more than eight miles an hour.”

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The truck, driven by a 19-year-old woman, was reportedly leaving the lot and was hit on its empty passenger side. Pushed sideways, the truck then swung around, snapped a sign for the railroad crossing, and hit the side of the train, police said.

That’s where most of the truck’s damage occurred, according to Taylor.

Eventually, the truck was pushed off the pavement onto a dirt and grass area at the side of the tracks, where it came to a rest facing southeast.

Tire tracks could be seen on the pavement running the approximate 20 feet between the area where the truck was allegedly stopped to where it came to rest.

The train pulled through the rest of the crossing and stopped.

Police, Goodwill Ambulance and the Pottstown Fire Department all were dispatched around 12:15 p.m.

The driver, who was not named, was treated by a Goodwill Ambulance but did not require hospitalization. Her mother arrived to pick her up.

A friend of the driver said that she was also a student at Montgomery Countmy Community College.

Damage was visible along the side of the truck, including significant damage to the front passenger side.

“A conductor saw her come up and stop and then drift forward but didn’t take it all the way,” Taylor said. “She said she didn’t see the train.”

Taylor said the crossing at the entrance and exit to the lot, which is available for college students next to the Schuylkill Riverfront Academic and Heritage Center, is private and does not require crossing signals or bells and doesn’t require the train to blow its whistle when going through.

A conductor was on the back of the train, Taylor said, in radio contact with the engines which were pushing the railcars.

An investigation is ongoing, but citations in the incident are unlikely.

Norfolk Southern railroad officials arrive on scene after 1 p.m. and measured the tracks with a tape measure, presumably checking to see if they were damaged at all.

College Drive was closed going westbound at North Hanover Street from around 12:20 until 1:30 p.m. by Pottstown Police and fire police and West End Fire Police controlled traffic headed eastbound through the scene from the other direction.